Deposed: Mohammah Mossadegh was removed as Iran's prime minister in a CIA coup whose details have just been revealed for the first time

Today marks the 60th anniversary of the coup in Iran which deposed prime minister Mohammad Mossadegh after he restricted the flow of oil to the West.

However, it is only now, six decades on, that the CIA has finally admitted that it was behind the revolution, which was one of the most significant landmarks in modern Iranian history.

It has long been widely acknowledged that the U.S. and British authorities were behind Mossadegh's overthrow - one factor behind the anti-Western sentiments shared by many in Iran which led to the 1979 Islamist revolution in the country.

However, the CIA has never publicised
its role in the operation, claiming that it needs to maintain secrecy
in order to protect its working methods and sources of information.

But today the agency released documents to the National Security Archive in which it admits that the coup 'was carried out under CIA direction as an act of U.S. foreign policy'.

The
operation, codenamed 'TPAJAX', was 'conceived and approved at the
highest levels of government', the documents - entitled 'The Battle for
Iran' and compiled in the 1970s - reveal.

The
agency admits that the coup, which saw the Shah persuaded to sack
Mossadegh and replace him with Fazlollah Zahedi, was a 'last resort' and
a 'policy of desperation'.

It took place on August 19, 1953, after negotiations between Britain and Iran over securing UK access to Iranian oil broke down.

Populist: Mossadegh alienated the West by nationalising Iran's oil supplies which were controlled by Britain

MI6
is thought to have asked the CIA to remove Mossadegh and install a
pro-Western leader, and the U.S. authorities readily agreed as a way of
getting the upper hand over the Soviets in the Cold War.

The
internal dossier says: 'It was the potential of those risks to leave
Iran open to Soviet aggression that compelled the United States in
planning and executing TPAJAX.'